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madroxed · 12 days ago

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roy/jamie - 1.5 days in marbella

MATCH MY TIMING [ted lasso | roy/jamie | post-s2 | @ ao3 | prompts open ] a/n: prompting me with an inside joke that's also perfect for them? iconic ♥︎ anyway somehow this is almost 3k idek.

“What,” Roy says, “the fuck are you doing here?” Jamie shrugs. His duffle bag’s slung over his shoulder and his sunglasses make him look like more of a prick than usual. “Was in the area,” he says, which makes no fucking sense at all.

“What,” Roy says, “the fuck are you doing here?”

Jamie shrugs. His duffle bag’s slung over his shoulder and his sunglasses make him look like more of a prick than usual.

“Was in the area,” he says, which makes no fucking sense at all. “Thought I’d check your pacemaker hadn’t given up and left you dying in your own shit.”

“Jesus Christ,” Roy mutters.

“Whatever,” Jamie says, and barges into the villa. “Move, would ya? I need to piss.”

Roy moves if only because he has no fucking clue what else to do. It’s possible he’s in hell, which isn’t a new feeling, especially when it comes to Jamie fucking Tartt.

Jamie disappears, dumping his bag and kicking off his trainers on the way. For some reason his shitty, over-priced t-shirt is now hanging off the corner of the kitchen table. He’s been here thirty fucking seconds.

Roy considers burning his limited edition high tops. It’s a nice image, but he can’t be arsed to listen to Jamie’s whining.

“Your soap smells like flowers,” Jamie says, holding his own palms up to his nose and then shoving them in Roy’s face. “See?”

“For fucksake,” Roy says. He knows what the fucking soap smells like. He’s been here three weeks already, of course he knows what the soap smells like.

“I’m starving,” Jamie says. “Lets get paella.”

His t-shirt’s still on the kitchen table but somehow he’s wearing an even trashier shirt with the buttons undone to his navel. It shines when he moves. Jamie makes being obnoxious seem like a bloody superpower.

“Fine,” he says, because he’s hungry, too — hasn’t had anything except increasingly sadder Mojitos since breakfast — and because agreeing is the quickest way of getting Jamie to explain….literally fucking anything, honestly.

They walk down the beach towards the Marina. Jamie’s got a headphone in one ear, the heavy thump of drum and bass catching on the wind every now and then. They don’t talk which is perfect, and Roy decides to pretend this isn’t one of the weirder things to happen in a chain of increasingly weird fucking years. It’s a pleasant night; still hot but the breeze off the sea’s making in tolerable, and the crowds have mostly dispersed to clubs and bars closer to the centre of town. It’d be nice, probably, if it wasn’t him and it wasn’t Jamie.

Jamie pulls his phone out of his stupidly tight jeans and spins round a few times before changing course; Roy rolls his eyes and follows to the seafood place heaving with tourists and watches as Jamie flirts and laughs and charms the hostess with truly appalling Spanish into finding them a table outside. Roy wants to say something about the benefits of air conditioning but he’s also not a prick, so he thanks her and kicks Jamie in the shin instead.

He doesn’t do it very hard because Jamie hadn’t given her their names.

“Surprised we’re not at fucking Linekars,” he says, scanning the menu. There’s more than one place around here that would usher them to VIP without a word, but that’s the most obvious.

Jamie shrugs. “Wouldn’t get you through the door, would I?”

He’s right. Being surrounded by wasted stag dos and eighteen year olds as they try and weasel their way into meeting athletes and drivers and Gary’s less famous creep of a brother is one of the worst ways he can think of spending his time. Roy would rather fucking die, thanks.

The waiter brings them water and Jamie orders a bottle of wine along with their starters, butchering the name. Roy’s not surprised to discover he’s just picked the most expensive one, mocking him about it until their food arrives.

They talk about work as they eat, exchanging ideas for next season and bad impersonations of Ted and Beard and their teammates. It’s Jamie, surprisingly, that goes off on a five minute rant about Nate, everything from betrayal and ego to the way he looks at Keeley. Here he pauses, like maybe he shouldn’t have said it, but Roy just sips at his mediocre wine and doesn’t call him out on hypocrisy given the last year.

There’s a lot he could say about Jamie Tartt, but at least he’s fucking trying.

Jamie doesn’t bring up Keeley again. Steers clear of anything that would come close as if he’s trying to spare Roy’s feelings which is a fucking joke. Sure, Roy feels bruised in a way he’s not used to, not broken just wounded, but he loves Keeley enough not to be a twat about it, gets why she’s not here with him right now.

He still doesn’t get why her ex is, though.

“No seriously,” he says, when they’ve skipped dessert in favour of coffee. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“Told ya,” Jamie says. “I was in the area.”

Roy stares him down. Jamie grins, twirling his teaspoon between his fingers.

“Prick,” Roy sighs eventually, and Jamie laughs and makes Roy cover the bill.

Roy makes Jamie sleep on the sofa. There’s a perfectly good spare room down from his, but unwanted company doesn’t get the benefit of luxury sheets, so Roy just throws a blanket at him and hopes the little shit doesn’t trash the villa during the night.

Around three in the morning he gives up trying to sleep and slips into the kitchen for a glass of water. Jamie’s face down, nose mushed into the pillow, one leg cramped against the opposite arm and the other brushing the floor.

Roy leans against the counter and slowly drains one glass and then another, watching as Jamie makes little snuffling noises and clutches the pillow closer before he realises what he’s doing.

He takes the rest of his water back to his room.

Jamie’s shit’s still somehow everywhere the next morning but the man himself isn’t. There’s no note, just his worn boxers on the bathroom floor like the neanderthal Roy’s always known he is. Roy kicks them to the side and spends the day like every other since he got here, lounging by the private pool reading and drinking (steadily sadder Margaritas today) and not checking his phone more than once an hour.

It’s most people’s idea of fucking heaven, he’s sure.

Around three he’s scrolling through the Instagram account he only has because Keeley bribed him with sex and trying not to interact with the pictures she’s put up of her new office — he has nightmares about accidentally pressing that stupid bloody heart — when a new story from Jamie appears, full of scantily clad girls in bikinis and men fawning behind him with endless bottles of beer.

The bastard’s fifteen minutes away at one of the beach clubs that aren’t even on the fucking beach, just segregated groups of men and women eyeing each other up across pools designed to photograph well, drinking enough cocktails and Prosecco to put them in a medically induced coma to the sound of shitty dance music by some bloke who has the nerve to call himself a DJ and paying a fortune for the privilege.

Roy puts his phone down. Drinks half his Margarita. Turns the page in his book. Picks his phone up again.

He sends Jamie the middle finger emoji.

Jamie replies immediately with the sun, a cocktail, a bikini, and — for some fucking reason — a wizard.

Roy goes back to his book.

Jamie shows up again after Roy’s finished dinner.

Roy’d expected him to stumble in half-cut and bragging, or with some barely legal beauty queen hanging off his arm, but he just slouches past Roy to the fridge where he grabs a can of fancy flavoured water that Roy regrets buying and fidgets with the tab for a bit.

He’s caught the sun. The bridge of his nose is starting to peel but he’s glowing the way English people only do when they’re abroad.

Jamie opens his water, clicking the tab back and forth until it breaks off and flicking it at Roy. He takes a long drink and pulls a face, pouring the rest down the drain. Roy smirks.

“Sorry about you and Keeley,” Jamie says out of fucking nowhere.

“Sure,” Roy says, when he remembers how to speak.

“No,” Jamie says, dragging the word out, frowning down at the empty can. “I am. Really. I know things were weird for a bit but I figured some shit out, yeah? And I just. I really am sorry. I dunno, I thought you two were…”

He fades off, like he can’t find the words or like the ones he can find are likely to go over Roy’s head or make him punch him.

Roy doesn’t say anything, and Jamie sways from one foot to the next.

“Why are you here, Jamie?” Roy asks eventually, when Jamie’s cheeks have started to colour and his fingers have pressed dents into the can.

Jamie sighs, but when he finally looks Roy in the eye it’s a challenge.

“I wanted to check on ya.”

It’s what he’d said yesterday too, and Roy waits for a punchline that doesn’t come.

The problem is, Jamie’s too easy to read these days. Roy’d have said he always has been except the stuff with his dad came out and blew apart a lot of preconceived notions and now Roy has to worry about the prick as well as — God — respect him a bit. Just a little. More on days he does what Roy fucking says.

But yeah, Jamie’s easy to read.

“I’m not sleeping with you,” Roy says, and Jamie’s neck floods red all the way up to his ears.

“I never fucking asked,” he says, immediately defensive.

Roy waits him out.

“I didn’t,” Jamie says, kicking the heel of his foot against the kitchen cupboard. “Doubt you could keep up anyway, old man.”

Roy rolls his eyes. “Why the hell would you even want to?”

That’s the truly baffling part. Jamie’s not exactly short of bed partners; Roy’s had to blacklist certain websites just so he’s not jump-scared on random Wednesdays with pictures of him no one needs to fucking see. Maybe this is about Keeley? That would make the most sense. Jamie’s been trying in every part of his life, and realising that Keeley Jones is the sort of woman men fight wars for isn’t a surprise, but they both love her too much for this to be mean, exes sleeping together in revenge or whatever shitty teenage bollocks American TV tries to pretend is normal.

Jamie’s staring at the floor tiles, sober and embarrassed and a little angry.

“I dunno,” he says, mumbling his words. “It wouldn’t be the worst thing ever. Keeley always said I have a thing for people who tell me what to do or whatever. It’s not a big deal.”

“Jesus,” Roy says.

It’s a fucking confession of all fucking things, three weeks into Roy’s breakup escape to Marbella, a place he wouldn’t have set foot if he hadn’t already booked the place because Keeley loves it. A place Jamie also loves because Keeley and Jamie have more things in common that Roy is remotely fucking comfortable admitting and that apparently includes him, bloody sodding Christ.

“So what if I fucking like you,” Jamie says, shoulders curling in on themselves. “I like Keeley too, you’re not special.”

It’s a truthful lie. Just comparing Roy and Keeley says more than Jamie probably ever meant to, and now Roy’s going back over every interaction they’ve ever had, trying to see when the switch flipped from casual disdain and on-pitch hatred to Jamie putting himself out there in a Spanish rental asking Roy to look at his love-life and think of him as an ampersand instead of a separate clause.

There was a time before Ted fucking Lasso when Roy wasn’t surprised by much of anything. Now it’s basically a weekly event.

“I’m still not sleeping with you,” Roy says, because screwing Jamie now would probably cause his whole world to implode or some shit. “But— for fucksake stop looking like I’ve run over your dog, come here.”

He steps forward and pulls Jamie into a hug, remembers how it’d felt last time with Jamie’s grief and anger crumpled against him, and likes this better. Jamie clings to the collar of his t-shirt, pulling it out of shape, his nose pressed into the curve of Roy’s neck. He’s shaking a little, and Roy runs his hands up his back, holds on tighter.

“Like, ever?” Jamie mutters, the words pressed against Roy’s skin. He’s pouting, the little shit.

“I don’t know, Jesus,” Roy says, because everything’s batshit crazy as it is, he’s not willing to put money on anything anymore.

And because—

Well.

Roy’s not an idiot, he knows he has a type.

Jamie presses closer. Roy knows better than to give him an inch and not expect to him to run the full fucking marathon.

“I’m leaving tomorrow,” Jamie says. “Takin’ Mum and Simon to Barbados for a week.”

Roy sighs.

“Come on,” he says and drags Jamie down the corridor to his room. He points a finger at him. “Underwear stays on.”

“Sure,” Jamie says agreeably, shrugging out of his shirt. He’s got a new tattoo since last season, another shitty thing Roy’ll make fun of him for when it doesn’t matter.

Roy’s not tired but he climbs into bed anyway, still in his t-shirt and shorts. Slides down until his head hits the pillow and waits. Jamie’s practically vibrating out of his skin, and neither of them are gonna get any fucking sleep with him like that, so Roy reaches out and pulls him into his side, lets Jamie shuffle until he’s comfortable, knees pressed against Roy’s thigh, head tucked over his arm.

“Go to fucking sleep,” he says, and Jamie sighs and does as he’s told.

Roy stares at the ceiling and eventually drifts off to the sound of Jamie’s snuffles and his own crowded thoughts.

Roy wakes to an empty villa.

He makes coffee, drinks it next to the pool whilst answering a string of increasingly crazy emails from Ted and a few saner, monosyllabic ones from Beard. He downloads a new thriller that Paula from yoga recommended to the Kindle he’d bought solely for this trip and gets annoyed at the WiFi when it takes too long to load.

He makes an omelette and eats it stood over the sink, changes into his trunks and swims laps until his body starts to object. Finally gets his stupid Kindle to open the book and then swears up a storm when he realises ten pages in that it’s shit, Paula’s crap taste in men bleeding all over the page. Downloads something else on a whim and then goes out for lunch instead.

Thirty-six hours and it’s weird that Jamie’s shit’s not flung everywhere, emotions included.

Roy’s still not sure what he’s supposed to fucking do about any of it. He wants to call Keeley — he always wants to call Keeley — but that’s the last thing she needs right now, even if she would be calm and sweet and helpful and offer to talk to Jamie about it for him.

Except then Jamie and her might sleep together, and Roy’s planning to bury the feelings that thought inspires under ten feet of concrete.

So he sleeps and eats and swims and reads and doesn’t think about how he hadn’t given Jamie a conclusive no.

Fuck.

One thing he’s learnt over the last few years is that overthinking is just going to make shit worse. Roy thinks about calling a meeting of the Diamond Dogs and laughs when he imagines Higgins’ face. Nah. There’s only one person he can fucking talk to about this and the little shit’s on his way to Barbados right now.

He makes it two full days before he caves and sends Jamie a string of nonsense emojis before he does anything worse — a mushroom, a tin of soup, and a star sign thing that might be Virgo or Sagittarius or just a random fucking squiggle for all Roy knows — and then follows it up with a link to a video of a kid screaming for two straight hours.

Roy feels better already.

Six hours later he gets a kissy face in response.

He might need a new phone, actually. Maybe he should move to Spain forever like every other ex-footballer and start a life sheep farming in the hills. Phoebe’d love it.

Christ.

He calls Jamie and hopes the fucker gets charged for long-distance.

“Hey,” Jamie says, picking up immediately. “What’s the difference between macarons and macaroons?”

“Don’t be a moron,” Roy replies and zones out as Jamie describes his flight and his mum’s swim shoes and the resort they’re staying at and the three people that have recognised him and bought him drinks even though the place is all-inclusive so it doesn’t really count, does it?

It’s possible, Roy thinks, that he’s brought this on himself.

“Don’t die on a fucking jet ski,” he says when Jamie makes noises about his day, and Jamie laughs.

“And deprive the world of all this? Yeah right.”

“I really fucking hate you,” Roy lies.

Jamie doesn’t even pretend to believe him. “Talk later, old man.”

Roy hangs up and reads three more chapters of his book. Cooks dinner. Showers. Presses the stupid red heart on a picture of Keeley’s new desk. Texts Jamie back.

His jug of Sangria just tastes like Sangria.

Things could be a lot fucking worse.

#my fic #ted lasso #roy x jamie #jamie x roy #ted lasso fic #prompt fill

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